Thanks for your comforting comments.
Some coworkers gave me some unexpected gifts a few days ago and it made me reflect on how I have been behaving lately. I have decided that I have become an uncompassionate, self-righteous person myself. Looking back on my journal a few days ago, it looks hateful in part to me now. It made me wonder how do we love those who believe they have a mandate from God and/or the nation to ignore the impact of their actions on others? I think the answer I have come to is It is not as important as helping those who suffer because of these people.
Jesus says to turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39) and love your enemies and bless those who persecute you (Matthew 5:44) but does not give a clear explanation as to why we should do this. I assumed that by showing enough love, I could change the behavior of these people, but I am learning after trying this for over ten years that people in my community rarely respond to kindness and often scoff at it.
Another option is to abuse these people, for example by quoting the timeless words of Vice President Dick Cheney: Go fuck yourself! This can be very affective, but if one is constantly encountering the hateful self-serving, like myself, one finds oneself constantly quoting the Vice President like a senile pope blessing everything he sees.
A more dispassionate response would be for me to minimize the harm caused by the hateful self-serving and protect ones sense of compassion. Minimizing the harm caused by the hateful involves comforting the afflicted. This seems pretty straightforward to me. It also involves stopping the hateful from harming others. Sadly, I have found this often reminds me of trying to piss into the wind. Very often, these people act in harmful ways precisely because they can get away with it. It is important, however, for me to avoid becoming jaded and miss an opportunity to prevent or mitigate harm to others.
Protecting ones sense of compassion is often much easier to do and perhaps this is the basis of Jesus teaching. A Buddha would agree that to desire revenge leads to suffering, either to oneself or others and so it is better to let things happen as they may. In doing so, one protects ones sense of compassion.
Regarding Saturdays dinner, I doubt there is much I can do to stop my nephews from becoming gun-loving neo-cons, especially since I see them less than four days a year. I will give them some multinational (i.e. unpatriotic) gifts and console myself with the knowledge that the gifts I buy for my sisters family are from compassionate organizations. I will give my adolescent niece a play by Moliere, among other things. Even if her parents discourage her from reading it, at least she will hear of the playwright. A friend of mine suggested I give donations to bleeding heart liberal organizations in the name of some of my sisters family members. I can see the look on their faces: Dear Dr. A., Thank you for your very generous donation to PFLAG Hmmm.
As for myself, I figure if an Iraqi prisoner can endure taser shocks and soaking in their own human waste for 18 hours, my Saturday should be a walk in the park.
Looking forward to sharing a drink with the Chipmunks.
P.S. Shameless Plug: Among the gifts I got for my coworkers are those from Anne Taintor Inc.
Some coworkers gave me some unexpected gifts a few days ago and it made me reflect on how I have been behaving lately. I have decided that I have become an uncompassionate, self-righteous person myself. Looking back on my journal a few days ago, it looks hateful in part to me now. It made me wonder how do we love those who believe they have a mandate from God and/or the nation to ignore the impact of their actions on others? I think the answer I have come to is It is not as important as helping those who suffer because of these people.
Jesus says to turn the other cheek (Matthew 5:39) and love your enemies and bless those who persecute you (Matthew 5:44) but does not give a clear explanation as to why we should do this. I assumed that by showing enough love, I could change the behavior of these people, but I am learning after trying this for over ten years that people in my community rarely respond to kindness and often scoff at it.
Another option is to abuse these people, for example by quoting the timeless words of Vice President Dick Cheney: Go fuck yourself! This can be very affective, but if one is constantly encountering the hateful self-serving, like myself, one finds oneself constantly quoting the Vice President like a senile pope blessing everything he sees.
A more dispassionate response would be for me to minimize the harm caused by the hateful self-serving and protect ones sense of compassion. Minimizing the harm caused by the hateful involves comforting the afflicted. This seems pretty straightforward to me. It also involves stopping the hateful from harming others. Sadly, I have found this often reminds me of trying to piss into the wind. Very often, these people act in harmful ways precisely because they can get away with it. It is important, however, for me to avoid becoming jaded and miss an opportunity to prevent or mitigate harm to others.
Protecting ones sense of compassion is often much easier to do and perhaps this is the basis of Jesus teaching. A Buddha would agree that to desire revenge leads to suffering, either to oneself or others and so it is better to let things happen as they may. In doing so, one protects ones sense of compassion.
Regarding Saturdays dinner, I doubt there is much I can do to stop my nephews from becoming gun-loving neo-cons, especially since I see them less than four days a year. I will give them some multinational (i.e. unpatriotic) gifts and console myself with the knowledge that the gifts I buy for my sisters family are from compassionate organizations. I will give my adolescent niece a play by Moliere, among other things. Even if her parents discourage her from reading it, at least she will hear of the playwright. A friend of mine suggested I give donations to bleeding heart liberal organizations in the name of some of my sisters family members. I can see the look on their faces: Dear Dr. A., Thank you for your very generous donation to PFLAG Hmmm.
As for myself, I figure if an Iraqi prisoner can endure taser shocks and soaking in their own human waste for 18 hours, my Saturday should be a walk in the park.
Looking forward to sharing a drink with the Chipmunks.
P.S. Shameless Plug: Among the gifts I got for my coworkers are those from Anne Taintor Inc.
personally i chalk up "turning the other cheek" to anti-violence (violence as a poor choice, continuing the cycle, etc.). as for loving your persecutors...never really thought about it outside of the "christian thing to do" mentality......no, i don't think you can change them (generally speaking); i would think that those who persecute are pretty far gone anyway. for some reason i always thought of that passage in the religious persecution context. i suppose hate in any context is bad; hate of course being different from anger, doesn't hate beget violence and misdeeds? but then again not-hating is certainly not loving. perhaps we should take pity on their ignorance? a puzzling passage indeed.